Simone
I’m expecting the call from Rocco but it still surprises me to hear his voice. It’s been a week since Shotgun’s death and he’s already been cremated, which was in his will. I haven’t seen Rocco in all that time. I haven’t done much of anything except sit up with Cecilia and try to make sure she isn’t sinking even further into a pit of despair. The more I think about Rocco, and Shotgun’s death, the more I realize that I can’t be with him. A man died. Just look at how devastated Cecilia is. Is this really the life I want?
I try to keep my voice casual as I respond.
“Hello.”
“Simone.” His voice is growly, full of emotions left unsaid. I wonder if he’s been thinking of that night in the booth as well. I wonder if he feels the strange mixture of lust and guilt and desire just like I do. “We’re riding into the desert tomorrow to scatter Shotgun’s ashes.”
“I know.”
I’m sitting at the kitchen counter, keeping my voice low. Cecilia is asleep on the couch, curled up into a ball.
“Your sister’s asked you to come.” It isn’t a question.
She hasn’t so much asked as begged. I tried telling her I didn’t want to see Rocco, even though that’s half a lie. I want to see him. I just can’t let myself. Cecilia fell for a biker and now she’s a wreck on the couch. It was our fault Shotgun died to begin with. Rocco’s world isn’t my world. There are too many reasons stacked against us.
“Hmm-mm,” I mumble, realizing I haven’t answered.
“So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know, Rocco. I just . . .”
“You don’t want to see me.”
I don’t reply to that. Instead I say, “Cecilia will be there no matter what.”
“Of course she will,” he says. “But don’t you think it’d mean a lot to her if you came? I know your parents ain’t coming. She needs at least one member of her family with her. You can’t just force her to go alone. Ain’t that cruel, Simone?”
“Cruel!” I hiss, covering my mouth with my hand so I don’t disturb Cecilia. “Cruel is bringing a perfectly good woman into a life of crime and then not even protecting yourself. Cruel is breaking a woman in half because you fancied another four or five drinks. I can’t get the image out of my head, Cecilia leaning against his shoulder like that. Why wasn’t he protecting her, or himself?”
“He should’ve been,” Rocco mutters. “I’ll never argue against that. But that’s done, and she needs you now. That’s all.”
“I think you’re using Cecilia as an excuse because you want to see me.”
He doesn’t reply at first. The silence hangs between us. In the background, I can hear people talking, glass knocking against glass. Maybe he’s at a bar. It’s one in the afternoon. Maybe he’s day drinking. Eventually he says, “You know I want to see you. But that isn’t the point.”
“Whose bike would I be riding out on?” I ask.
“What?” He seems caught off guard.
“You said you were riding out to the desert. Is it one of those biker salute deals? If so, whose bike would I be riding out on?”
“Mine,” he says. “If you want.”
If I want . . . That’s the crux of all this. Because I do want to. I want to quite badly.
“Just the funeral,” I say. “And then I’m done with the club. I’m done with bikers, and I’m done with—” I cut short. I feel mean. It’s not a good way to feel.
“Me,” Rocco finishes. “You’re done with me. Cecilia has all the details. We’ll pick you up tomorrow.”
He hangs up before I can say anything else. I spend the next hour cleaning my apartment, washing dirty dishes and collecting the empty ice cream containers and potato chip packets which Cecilia leaves scattered all over the place. I’ve just finished dusting when she sits up on the couch, rubbing her eyes. Her eyes have been red nonstop for this past week. I hear her in the night, weeping into her fist, or in her sleep, whispering for Shotgun to hold her.
She looks up at me. She doesn’t seem like the wild party chick anymore. This girl wouldn’t hack away my prom dress. This girl wouldn’t smoke cigarettes. She looks broken and much younger than twenty-five.
“I heard you with Rocco,” she says. “I’m guessing it was Rocco.”
“It was,” I confirm.
“And you’re coming?”
“I . . .” I want to tell her I’m not sure, but her expression is too vulnerable. “I’m coming.”
“I really loved him,” she says. “I know Mom and Dad and probably you thought it was just Cecilia being Cecilia, but I really, really loved him.”
“I know.” I can’t doubt it now, not after seeing how hard it’s hit her.
The next morning Cecilia and I are dressed in black standing outside my apartment building. It’s the hottest day of spring and already the funeral outfit is sticking to me. Cecilia doesn’t seem to notice the heat. She just stares straight ahead, as if she’s waiting for Shotgun to appear out of nowhere. Soon the rumbling of bikes sounds from a few streets over. I swallow. I know I shouldn’t be nervous about seeing Rocco. Today is for Simone, for Shotgun’s friends. And yet I feel like a woman who’s about to see her crush. I steel myself, make myself hard. It doesn’t matter what I felt in the booth. All that matters is the look on Cecilia’s face and the blood on the dance floor.
My street is filled with bikes, at least one hundred and fifty of them, so many that people look out of their windows and cars blast their horns. Rocco climbs from a bike at the head of the army. Beast stands at his shoulder. He looks at me once, quickly, and then turns to Cecilia. “You’ll be riding with Beast, if that works for you, Cecilia. He’s my VP now.” He speaks to her respectfully. I feel an ache in my chest. Could this man really be good? Could he really be different from the life he leads?
“Let’s get going,” he says after a pause, looking around at the watching bystanders. “One of these folks might feel like dialing 911. Come on.”
I put on the jacket and the helmet that Rocco gives me, and then climb onto his bike behind him. I keep telling myself that I should be focused on Cecilia and the funeral, but as we ride out into the desert I’m achingly aware of my hands on his belly. Being this close to him, even if there is leather between us, reminds me of the night in the booth. The vibrations of the bike are like the gyrations of our lovemaking. I feel sick with guilt. It’s wrong. Cecilia is breaking into a million pieces and here I am getting wet from the rumbling of a motorcycle.
We stand in a solemn line as Rocco and then Cecilia give speeches in the desert. All around us, the desert stretches out, the sun beating down on the sand. A hundred and fifty bikers sweating into their leathers, Rocco shouting into the dead quiet, and then Cecilia weeping and sobbing at the front of the group. I think that’s it, and I’m ready to go—Rocco looks good in his suit and the last thing I need right now is for Rocco to look good—but then some of the men start assembling a marquee with pieces stored across all of their bikes.
“Do you think he’ll be okay out here?” Cecilia asks me, sipping Diet Coke and squinting across the desert.
“Yes,” I tell her, as the bikers talk around us. “Of course he will.”
It’s the only thing I can tell her. I’ve never given much thought to death or ashes or deserts. Cecilia leaves me alone a few minutes later, going to talk with some of the club girls. I sip my Diet Coke, trying to get through this without an incident. But then Rocco taps me on the shoulder. “Can we speak in private for a second?” he asks.
I want to say no, but then Cecilia might see me causing a fuss. I can’t cause a fuss here, so I follow Rocco over to the bikes. Standing in the unwavering sun away from the DIY reception, Rocco looks at my face for a long time without saying anything.
“What?” I say, after almost half a minute. “You’re making me nervous.”
“The violence has messed you up,” he says. “I see that, Simone, just by looking at you. But I need to know if what we had—goddamn, I sound like a woman.” He lowers his voice. “I need to know if what we did, how we talked with each other . . . Was it all just in my imagination? The sex in the booth, it felt like more than sex at the time. Didn’t it?” His dark eyes widen imploringly.
“Sex in the booth?” I shake my head slowly as if I have no idea what he’s talking about. I have to be cold. I have to end this now. After this funeral, I’m back on the straight and narrow. No more bikers, no more violence, no more criminals. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The jokes, the fun, the chemistry . . .” He makes to go on, but then takes a step back. “Fuck, Simone. Just—fuck.”
He pushes past me, returning to the marquee. My chest feels empty, my belly twisted as though with butterflies. I feel like a piece of dirt as I turn and see him, hands in his pockets, joining a group of bikers. He’s their leader now, I know, which makes it all the more complicated. I tell myself I’ve done the right thing. I can’t get with the leader of a criminal biker club. That’s exactly what Cecilia did, and look at her, weeping silently as the club girls ply her with whisky from a hipflask.
“Straight and narrow,” I whisper, making my way back to the party.